


Are You Worried

by BlueDarknessIceHeart



Series: Fireteam: Aeterno [3]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Developing Relationship, Emotionally inept characters, F/M, Non canon supers, Temporary Character Death, The Pyramidion - Freeform, partially canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2018-01-22
Packaged: 2019-03-08 01:17:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13447446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueDarknessIceHeart/pseuds/BlueDarknessIceHeart
Summary: "You sound almost worried." Ikora sounded nearly joking, her line switched so the fireteam currently in the Pyramidion couldn't hear her."What purpose would my worry serve?" Asher snapped back, eyes scanning coordinates that matched nothing he knew of the Pyramidion, the somehow calm voice of Rhaina still flowing through the line to them as some sort of assurance that something was fine.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this comes before Aftermath, has small time skips everywhere, and is multi-chaptered because otherwise it'd be a mess.

Having the other two members of Aeterno pester him was bad on a decent day. Their hunter, Kaylen-9, clearly knew how to cause trouble but also respected some semblance of boundaries. Their titan, Alsenna, however - she was a menace that not even Zavala could wrangle. 

Rhaina was who he was used to, but her appearing with both partners in tow and a set to her shoulders was an immediate trigger for some alarm in the back of his mind. 

He was still dismissive even as she gave him her usual smile, this one smaller and seemingly sadder. The flicker of emotion he felt was kept hidden as Rhaina's teammates walked up behind her. 

"What, exactly, are you three doing here?" 

There was no immediate answer, the look on Rhaina's face one he recognized. It was an answer she didn't like, didn't want to give - one she made when there was a mistake in her work. 

"We're the team going into the Pyramidion." 

Asher didn't like the cold weight he felt in his stomach, or the grim look Rhaina was trying to hide. 

\- - - 

Asher had given her Valakadyn when she first truly swept through Io. Your typical thanks for a guardian: a decent gun. 

Making sure it was still in perfect working order as she sat perched on a nearby rock, eyes consistently check over Kaylen and Alsenna to make sure they were behaving, was almost calming. 

Until Zavala crackled over her comms, anyways. 

"Alright, Fireteam Aeterno. It's time to head out." 

Strikes did not make her nervous. They had taken down gods, what was one more giant vex? 

At least that's what she wanted to tell herself, despite the way something twisted in her throat as Kaylen and Alsenna hopped on their sparrows without any hesitation. 

She'd wanted to stop by Asher's to give him some of her last journals, updated research and sketches of locations of increased activity, scribbled theories she might not be able to follow after this. 

\--- 

Zavala had handed them over to Ikora and Asher as soon as they'd reached location.

"You seek Brakion, the Genesis Mind. It is programmed to transform every speck of matter on this moon into a machine." Asher sounded unfairly calm. 

She had heard about Brakion in fleeting pieces before, but Alsenna and Kaylen hadn't. The connect was quick, and the looks she saw weren't helping the unease she felt. 

Getting into the Pyramidion was almost too easy. Dead vex, standing on plates - it was like the Vault of Glass all over again. Standing on plates and hoping this would go alright. 

Not snapping at ghost for being snarky towards Asher throughout the initial trek into the Pyramidion was a whole other task. The quick flick she gave his shell was enough to quiet him, thankfully, and they moved on with relative ease. Ducking through the warp gate was as disorienting as ever, and Rhaina managed to snag Alsenna by her titan mark. 

"Wait wait wait." 

"Why am I waiting, exactly? We have a big, fuck off level Vex to kill." 

Rhaina nodded towards the lasers that sprung up from the ground directly in front of the titan's feet. "That's why."

Rhaina went last through every set, Alsenna never quite making it through the first time and the titan pulling herself off the ground post revive at least five different times. 

Asher startled the three of them as they neared a drop. "I'm seeing an unacceptable level of variance in my field instruments. I hypothesize Taken interference. Eliminate them." 

Rhaina's comm was on at all times, so the _"sweet fuck!"_ of the lasers clipping her as she dropped rang through both Asher and Ikora's comms.


	2. Chapter 2

"You sound almost worried." Ikora sounded nearly joking, her line switched so the fireteam currently in the Pyramidion couldn't hear her. 

"What purpose would my worry serve?" Asher snapped back, eyes scanning coordinates that matched nothing he knew of the Pyramidion, the somehow calm voice of Rhaina still flowing through the line to them as some sort of assurance that something was fine.   
\---

"Asher can't figure out where you are. If he drops out, it's because he's thrown a tantrum and broken his microphone." Ikora sounded almost pleased with herself, but Rhaina felt sick. 

They were staring down another warp gate, and Asher couldn't locate them even with all the data the tech gave. 

"Ikora-" Rhaina started to speak, only for Asher to cut in over her. 

"I heard that you wretch!" 

"Asher, temper. But - we can't currently be located?" 

"No." Asher sounded more stressed than angry, and it didn't help. 

"Oh for fuck's sake why does this asshole get spinning lasers but Zavala won't let me dick around in the crucible when I want?" Alsenna's voice came from ahead of her, and she sighed. 

"Not to mention the taken." Kaylen, already lining up shots, and Rhaina settled down to do the same. 

\---

"You should now be entering a Hilbert space, if the Taken have not misaligned the Pyramidion's base geometric intuitions." a much calmer Asher came back over the mic. 

"Gesundheit." Ghost, from her shoulder. 

"Ghost!" 

"What, not the time?" 

"No, not the time. Not the place, we're having a very long discussion if I don't snap my neck coming out of a warp gate. I swear, dipping back into straight Light did something to you and I don't like it. Now quit being an asshole to Asher and apologize while I figure out just how we're going to get to all of these towers without dying or I'm putting you back in the backpack." 

Crouching behind a very small wall and planning out what would work best while Ghost gave what sounded like a very genuine apology felt normal, to an extent. 

"Okay, so, Kaylen you're going to go for those back two. You have the whole hunter twirly shtick going for you. Alsenna, you lay down good cover fire, get in there if any minotaurs come after us. I'm going to snipe down those hobgoblins and get these front two. Got it?" 

"Got it." the two replies worked for her, and they all set out.

Of course, something had to go wrong. 

Like Kaylen getting caught out by a minotaur in the worst way possible and being sent over the edge, Rhaina sprinting towards where she could see the hunter clinging to the side of the platform. 

"Alsenna! Need some titan strength here!" 

She clung to Kaylen's arm, the exo scrambling to try and pull herself up as Rhaina herself started to slip. 

"Nonono, come on, just hold on a little longer Alsenna's coming I can hear her heavy ass." 

Kaylen looked terrified, face plates shifted to a degree she hadn't seen in a long, long time. 

Alsenna went for Kaylen first, heaving the exo up onto the platform and dragging Rhaina back with her. 

"Can we not do that again? No more getting punted by minotaurs, please?" Alsenna held Kaylen to her, Rhaina slowly pushing herself up and staring down the last warp gate. 

\--- 

Asher let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. 

The panic that had laced Rhaina's voice was not something he'd heard before, and he didn't want to hear it again.


	3. Chapter 3

"According to my projections, you should now be approaching the lake of radiolarian fluid where I was afflicted." 

"No lake, Asher. Just a giant, ominous pit. Reality bending Brakion?" Rhaina offered up some sort of solution, if Brakion could alter reality inside the Pyramidion maybe the Mind got rid of the lake. 

"Do you really think you should be going into another pit?" Ghost piped up from her shoulder and she huffed.

"Hush." 

She toed the edge of the pit, before looking to Alsenna and Kaylen. 

"Last one down summons it." 

\---

Alsenna looked tiny in front of the vex gate. 

"It's just a vex gate." Ghost. 

"Ah! The Vex gate at the center of the lake!" Asher, who sounded almost too happy. 

"What lake!?" Ghost, who sounded annoyed. 

"The lake where you will grind Brakion's horns into dust and crush its chassis beneath your boot - that lake!" The damn near determination in Asher's voice had her readying her gun before the gate even whirled to life. 

\---

For a fireteam that had taken down gods, they were not having an easy go of this. 

Alsenna was streaked with her own blood, Kaylen's mended leg broken and sparking - the inky liquid streaking across the bright silver of skin jarring. 

Rhaina was worried. She knew they were all getting low on ammo, and sure - Brakion was headless and rushing around now but Vex weren't any less dangerous without a head. 

The pools of arc Alsenna had left behind from her super were starting to fade, Kaylen curled behind cover. 

"I'm out." it was not what she wanted to hear from the titan, with the amount of harpies she saw. 

"I'm low." 

Rhaina was moving out of Brakion's reach, trying to keep an eye on Kaylen and Alsenna - but she heard Alsenna drop and could hear Kaylen's gun clip run to nothing. 

She'd been swirling with void light for long enough, it was common in their battles ever since Hellmouth. What wasn't common was the emotional trigger that sent it spiraling from swirls up her wrists and around her neck to an engulfing cold. To vision burned with violet, to what should have been something as easy as breathing taking everything out of her. 

She managed to make her way to where Kaylen lay, her Ghost setting off the revive as Asher came over the comms. 

"Well? Did you find Brakion? Did you sever its arm from its chassis and send it spiraling into the infinite?" 

"Brakion's done for." Rhaina managed before Kaylen propped her up against the small rock and rushed towards Alsenna's ghost. 

"Ikora she pulled another Hellmouth." Ghost sounded frantic, shell spinning as the blue light gave her something to focus on. 

Rhaina felt herself being lifted up and she made a hissing sound. 

"Kaylen-" 

"It's alright, I won't say anything." 

\--- 

Asher dragged a hand down his face. The mission in the Pyramidion had been a success, but no one would tell him what exactly happened. If everyone made it out alive, intact, anything.

Why, exactly, Rhaina had not come back for her books, for her journals. Things that they traded out almost daily. He hadn't seen her in over a week. 

Waiting for Ikora to answer his call only made him more uneasy, more agitated. 

"Ikora." 

"She's fine, Asher." 

"Clearly not or she would Be. Here." 

"Why, Asher Mir, are you worried?" 

There it was again, the implication that he cared on some deeper level than conducting quality research with someone genuinely competent. 

"If I say I am will you tell me why she isn't here?" 

"She should be the one to tell you." 

"So something happened that you're entirely unwilling to tell me." 

"She's in the med bay, I'm holding her for four extra days since the last time she did this I had to keep her for a month." 

That did not make him feel better. 

He cut the call and was packing her things as carefully as he would his own, something gnawing at the back of his mind that if anything had happened to her it was somehow his fault. 

The sigh that came from him as he pulled the bag onto his shoulder was heavy in a way he couldn't quite unravel, and it unnerved him. 

Maybe he did care. Maybe he was worried. 

He'd never admit it, of course.


End file.
